dummy

English

Etymology

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Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ʌmi

Noun

dummy (plural dummies)

1. A silent person; a person who does not talk.
2. An unintelligent person.

   Don't be such a dummy!

3. A figure of a person or animal used by a ventriloquist; a puppet.
4. Something constructed with the size and form of a human, to be used in place of a person.

   To understand the effects of the accident, we dropped a dummy from the rooftop.

5. A deliberately nonfunctional device or tool used in place of a functional one.

   The hammer and drill in the display are dummies.

6. (Australian, New Zealand, UK) A pacifier.

   The baby wants her dummy.

7. (card games, chiefly bridge) A player whose hand is shown and is to be played from by another player.
8. (UK) A bodily gesture meant to fool an opposing player in sport; feint.
   • 2011 January 12, Saj Chowdhury, “Liverpool 2 - 1 Liverpool”, BBC:

     Raul Meireles was the victim of the home side's hustling on this occasion giving the ball away to the impressive David Vaughan who slipped in Taylor-Fletcher. The striker sold Daniel Agger with the best dummy of the night before placing his shot past keeper Pepe Reina.

9. (linguistics) A word serving only to make a construction grammatical.

   The pronoun "it" in "It's a mystery why this happened" is a dummy.

10. (programming) An unused parameter or value.

    If flag1 is false, the other parameters are dummies.

Synonyms

• (a thing in the form of a person): mannequin, marionette
• (a pacifier): pacifier (US), soother (Canada)

Derived terms

• dummy bid
• dummy bidder

Related terms

• dumb

See also

• dud
• fake
• feint

External links

• http://www.languagehat.com/archives/002594.php

Translations

a silent person

Italian: taciturno (it)

Serbo-Croatian: mučaljivac (sh), mutavac (sh)

an unintelligent person

Bulgarian: тъпак (bg) m. Czech: hlupák (cs) m. Finnish: tollo (fi) Italian: stupido (it) m., scemo (it) m. Macedonian: глупак (mk) (glúpak) m., глупачка (mk) (glúpačka) f. Polish: głupek (pl) m.

Russian: дурак (ru) (durák) m., глупец (ru) (glupéc) m., дурень (ru) (dúren') m., дура (ru) (dúra) f. f., болван (ru) (bolván) m., чайник (ru) (čájnik) m., тупица (ru) (tupíca) m. and f., бестолочь (ru) (béstoloč') f. Serbo-Croatian: glupan (sh), budala (sh), blesan (sh), tupan (sh), tupavac (sh), blentavac (sh), blento (sh)

something constructed with the size and form of a human

Bulgarian: манекен (bg) m. Czech: figurína (cs) f., panák (cs) m. Estonian: mannekeen (et) Finnish: mallinukke (fi) Italian: manichino (it) m., sagoma (it) f., fantoccio (it) m.

Macedonian: кукла (mk) (kúkla) f. Polish: manekin (pl) m. Scottish Gaelic: (female) breugag (gd) f. Serbo-Croatian: maneken (sh) Spanish: maniquí (es) m.

a pacifier

Bulgarian: залъгалка (bg) f. Chinese: Mandarin: 奶嘴 (cmn) (nǎizuǐ) Czech: dudlík (cs) m. Dutch: fopspeen, speen m. Finnish: tutti (fi) French: suce (fr), sucette (fr) f., tétine (fr) f., tototte (fr) f. German: Schnuller (de) m., Beruhigungssauger (de) m. Greek: πιπίλα (el) (pipila) f.

Hungarian: cumi (hu) Italian: ciuccio (it) m., ciucciotto (it) m., succhiotto (it) m. Japanese: おしゃぶり (ja) (o-shaburi) Macedonian: цуцла (mk) (cúcla) f. Polish: smoczek (pl) m. Portuguese: Chupeta (pt) f. Russian: соска (ru) (sóska) f., пустышка (ru) (pustýška) f. Serbo-Croatian: duda varalica (sh), cucla (sh) Spanish: chupete (es) m.

nonfunctional device or tool used in place of a functional one

Bulgarian: бутафория (bg) f. Czech: atrapa (cs) f. Finnish: malli (fi) German: Attrappe (de) f.

Italian: simulacro (it) m. Macedonian: макета (mk) (makéta) f. Polish: atrapa (pl) f. Serbo-Croatian: atrapa (sh)

(bridge) The partner of the winning bidder, who shows his or her hand.

Bulgarian: мор (bg)

Italian: morto (it) m.

Verb

dummy (third-person singular simple present dummies, present participle dummying, simple past and past participle dummied)

1. To make a mock-up or prototype version of something, without some or all off its intended functionality.

   The carpenters dummied some props for the rehearsals.

2. To feint
   • 2011 February 1, Mandeep Sanghera, “Man Utd 3 - 1 Aston Villa”, BBC:

     The more glamorous qualities usually associated with him are skill and pace and he used those to race on to a ball across him and dummy a defender before having a right-foot shot saved.

   • 2011 January 15, Kevin Darling, “West Ham 0 - 3 Arsenal”, BBC:

     For the first, the 30-year-old allowed Walcott space on the right to send in a pass that was expertly dummied by Samir Nasri, allowing Van Persie to swivel and smash right-footed past Robert Green.

Derived terms

• dummy out
• dummy up